This was actually in early September, and so you may be wondering to yourself:
"Why have you taken this long to review this?"
Well, if you live in the UK, you may notice how the weather has finally started changing into wintery weather, and so now is a good time to reflect on our summer as it is a thing of the past. It's never a nice time to see the summer go away for another year, that is, if you don't like autumn/winter. I don't really like these seasons, as the UK only ever sees the same type of weather throughout, which is the weather you see when Frodo and Sam are in Mordor in the Lord of the Rings.
This may sound like a bit of an exaggeration, and to be honest I would say it is short of realism, a more better use of words to describe autumn/winter weather for you would be; dark, cloudy, rain, grim, dead/dying plants, rain, gloomy, no sunshine, rain, miserable, depressing, rain, cold, windy, rain, dull and finally rain.
The only place I have seen that looks nice in Autumn is New York, am I right people?
So now you know (if you didn't know already) what the weather is like now and soon in the UK, now to tell you about the adventures and the lovely weather that occurred in Croatia... I could go on and go into detail about the miserableness of the British weather, however I don't want to sound old.
I still wear the Unknown festival wristband today, and it can get annoying sometimes though, such as when your making a coffee in the morning and whilst your stirring you find the end of the wristband is swimming around in your mug as you stir. Other than that I can't complain, for whatever I'm doing, I'm always reminded of this glorious festival...which actually I haven't stated to you yet...which by the way, this festival was absolutely brilliant, and the best festival I've been to, to date. It's time for the main event of this post, strap yourselves in...or on.
Derpiness & Drama...before we left.
So as you may have guessed, it was not just me heading to Unknown festival, I was to also to be accompanied by Dave Collins, and so the original plan I had in mind was for Dave to drive to mine, and then we would finish packing, grab something to eat and then simply get an early night, ready for our departure.
This did not happen.
What actually happened was that we didn't really pay attention to the weight and dimension restrictions that Ryanair imposed, which by the way, was our first time at flying with them. So in a derpy manor, we packed all of our things (something I personally should have done earlier but didn't), and found that our main luggage was around 5-7Kg above the limit. This was due to us deciding to bring our tent, in which Mr Collins then stated the idea of buying one when we get there, so we reduce our luggage weight, as the festival had this service available. I email them a request to get one for the next day, in which 3 minutes later I had a reply stating that they had sold out.
The solution to this dilemma was that we found that my hand luggage was 7Kg under, and so was Dave's, and so we had to cram all of our clothes and other minor things into our hand luggage and we were hard at work trying to get the weight correct for around 3 hours. In fact this took so long, we went on a break half way through to get something to eat. So the first trip of the holiday was to McDonalds. Eventually when we got back to continue derping around with the luggage, we finished up at around 1:30am, and we were due to get back up at 8:00am...the derpiness doesn't end there.
Derpiness & Drama... When We Left.
Departure day, everyone's favourite day. Knowing that there is holiday ahead of you, and that you are leaving your troubles behind. Departure day is also a very important day, because it's all about remembering all necessary paperwork in order to even get onto the flight. So from not having my usual good lengthly hours of sleep, getting up and going was surprisingly smooth. Derpiness began when arriving at Birmingham Airport.
We had a long stay 1 car parking space reservation, and so like most people that don't know what they're doing, we looked for signs for long stay 1. We found it and when speaking through the intercom at the entrance they said to go to the Drop & Go car park.
Once there, we noticed signs stating this area of the car park was for dropping people off only, max stay 15 minutes. So we asked the intercom person again if were in the right car park, which they then told us to go back the way we came, to the long stay 1 area. So we went back and simply drove in and eventually after around 10 minutes, found a space for my car. Whilst getting a transfer bus to the terminal, I was re-reading my printed reservation, and then I discovered a small print paragraph on the bottom stating:
"Leave your car with one of our courteous and professional drivers in the Drop and Go car park adjacent to terminal. The NCP Official Valet Drop Off point is located on the right as you enter the Drop & Go Car Park, immediately behind the Novotel."
This was not where my car was parked.
At this point not only was I stressed out, but we were also running short of time. Now when remembering back to that time, I remember I wasn't actually calm about our departure, as I was worrying about all the 'what if' situations, such as what if our luggage is out again? what if Im going to get a fine for my car? what if we take so long checking in we miss our flight? what if I've forgotten something? ...those types of what if situations.
Anyway check in was remarkably easy, as we had already checked in online, and thankfully I can confirm that our luggage was spot on accurate. Upon finishing check in, there was a lot of relief released from within me.
The next stage, like at all airports was the security, which was also surprisingly easy and quick, which further helped me calm down. The strange thing about our pre-departure was that it wasn't very long, at all. We had time to pee, time to randomly browse alcohol, and electronics for approximately 20 minutes, and then we were already able to move to our gate. Boarding was also pretty quick, as Ryanair staff, for some reason, seemed to be in a rush, not sure why. We seemed to have experienced what the military may go through when boarding planes, it was something like:
"Move straight down to the middle of the plane,
go go, straight down, sit down and make sure
your hand luggage is not in the way, hurry,
sit down in any available seat, and put your
seat belts on, quick...MOVE IT PRIVATE! GOD DAM
IT MOVE YOUR ASS AND PARK IT, PRONTO!"
Okay so the last bit was fictional,
but they may as well have said it.
Now since I was 5 months old, I have been on planes. I can't really count how many times I've been on flights, but believe it or not, Im not 100% comfortable with flying. Long flights actually, are better for me for some reason, but I feel that short euro flights are bumpy, which is something I don't really like. I am actually fine with flying apart from the following:
Turbulence (Rough ones)
The feeling as the pilot decreases acceleration just after take off (know what I mean? I don't know If I've explained it well)
Side wind (during the flight, and when landing)
Thankfully there was no side wind to report, nor bad turbulence. So all in all the flight was good. Once landing in Trieste in Italy, I couldn't help but notice how much warmer it was, even in the late afternoon...this put a smile on my face.
If your reading this and your wondering 'Why is he in Italy? I thought he was going to Croatia?' please have a read of my previous post, as this will detail our travel itinerary.
So without the use of your imagination, you have seen a picture of our plane, and now, a satisfied Dave Collins:
As much as I was just wanting to chill out in the sun at this point, especially after the morning derpiness, we had to go in, and go inside and to security, and by security I mean 'The look at your passport and receive a nod of the head by an Italian guard area'.
I find that the security was more easier getting into Italy than getting into The Warehouse Project in Manchester. Anyway we began the glorious stage of having to wait for your main luggage to come through the conveyer belt via magical portal, and I was hoping (almost like everyone else) that our luggage was to come out first. Im sure Im not the only one that hopes this when at that stage.
I mean you've just landed, and your holiday has officially begun, so why wait around for your luggage? You just want to go grab it yourself and get out there, but alas we all must wait.
To be fair, our luggage was pretty quick, we only had to wait approximately 5 minutes.
At this stage as you are reading this, you may think that there has not been a lot of derpy events since the morning, but Im afraid more derpiness follows. So as we have our luggage, and we have to wait for our coach transfer. Our flight ticket stated that we landed at around 4:20pm, and our coach transfer was at 5:45pm. So whilst we waited, we thought of indulging in Italian food.
So I decided to have this, which was called a 'Contadino'. I still don't know what was in it, I believe it had melted cheese, some sort of ham, and something else. I can also confirm this was obtained using derpy Italian. The next derpiness, was by me...and it was a colossal derp by me. The conversation went like this: (as we were eating our contadino, waiting around...)
*Chewing sounds*
Dave
"Hey Chang, when is our coach again?"
Me
"Erm, at 17:45"
Dave
"Wait wait, hold on...Chang, were in Italy."
Me
"Yeah...I know, duh."
Dave
"As in, were not in the UK anymore?"
Me
"Well obviously"
Dave
"So...what dya think this means?"
Me
"What are you on about Dave!"
Dave
"Time difference?"
Me
"Oh shit!"
I can tell you, there was a mad rush then, as the time in fact,
was actually 17:35pm.
This really was an annoying rush, as I did that motion where you want to run, but your lugging all your stuff, so you have to do that odd looking run/walk, whilst sweaty faced, and not being able to wipe it because your hands are full. Then to make matter worse, for me, there was no escalator going down, only one going up (to where we were).
So I then had to proceed in oddly rushing down the stairs whilst having the main luggage swinging around taking most of my weight with it. Im just glad there was no one walking up, as my luggage would have rammed them back down the stairs.
We rushed outside, to see a gathering of young people surrounding some coaches, this was our destination.
So as you can see, my main luggage was a big squashie bag, which mainly contained the tent, the air beds and all the liquids we had. May I also point out, that I was wearing jeans whilst oddly rushing around in warm weather, so this was a tad unpleasant.
Ladies and Gentleman this is the end of Part 1.
I don't know how many part there are to be, probably
3, maybe 4.
I will now leave you with the last picture of this post, which was supposed to be showing you all the coach we were riding on, instead its an excellent photo bomb from some guy, well done sir, whomever you are.
End of Part 1.
